First Reading
Acts of the Apostles 3:13-15, 17-19
Peter said to the people: “The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and denied in Pilate’s presence when he had decided to release him. You denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. The author of life you put to death, but God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses. Now I know, brothers, that you acted out of ignorance, just as your leaders did; but God has thus brought to fulfillment what he had announced beforehand through the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer. Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away.”
Second Reading
1 John 2:1-5a
My children, I am writing this to you so that you may not commit sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one. He is expiation for our sins, and not for our sins only but for those of the whole world. The way we may be sure that we know him is to keep his commandments. Those who say, “I know him, ” but do not keep his commandments are liars, and the truth is not in them. But whoever keeps his word, the love of God is truly perfected in him.
Gospel Cycle Cycle B
Luke 24:35-48
The two disciples recounted what had taken place on the way, and how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread. While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have.” And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them. He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. And he said to them, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”
If there is one thought that ties all three readings together today, it is the thought of repentance for sins. The suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ brings forgiveness of sins for those who repent of their sinfulness.
Somehow, today, we humans do not want to acknowledge that we are sinners. We find all kinds of ways to speak about our brokenness, but we do not want to use the work “sin.” We seem to have fairly low self esteem according to many reports, and yet we would not want to admit that we might be sinners.
Some of this problem comes from a faulty understanding of sin. Many Christians and Catholics were raised simply with a list of sins: if you do this, you are sinning. In this kind of understanding of sin, there is very little of the recognition of anything personal involved in sin, very little of a relationship with a God who loves us and also very little understanding of how sins diminishes our capacity for full human life.
On the other hand, such lists of sins are fairly accurate lists of the actions that honestly do diminish the capacity for in-depth human life. Certainly the authors of all of the readings that we have heard today were aware of lists of sins! Any of us can read the Scriptures and make a list of those actions that are considered sinful.
The challenge for each of us today is to ponder what sin means to us personally and to ask ourselves if that understanding is formed by the Scriptures and by Jesus Christ, or is it something else, something from our families, something from culture or something from our friends.
Only when we begin to understand what sin means in the Scriptures can we begin to understand today’s readings, which speak about repentance, conversion, the wiping away of sins, the expiation of sins and the forgiveness of sins—all of which are part of today’s readings.
The joy of today’s readings is for the person who knows that he or she is a sinner and needs forgiveness and expiation. A sinner who is being converted should be able to say: I would like to think of myself as a sinner! I want to know the loving presence of Jesus Christ saying: I forgive you your sins! I want to know conversion so that my life becomes turned around and focused on God and not on me. I want truly to be sorry for my sins. And at the same time, I want to feel confidence in God and because of God’s love, confidence in my own life. I want to be able to choose for God in every aspect of my life.
This is salvation for us! It is Jesus Christ who makes this inner awareness of God’s love and forgiveness possible in life. It is Jesus Christ who makes us humans capable of giving ourselves to others in love.
Like the disciples in the Gospel, we can meet the Lord. Like them, we can become convinced that he is not a ghost, but a living being present in our lives today. By listening to His words in the Scriptures and meditating deeply on his actions and life, we come to know how God is present in Jesus and how God is present in us. We can give thanks to the Lord for this great day of salvation. We learn to rejoice in the suffering and death of Jesus because He rises from the dead and gives us the possibility of life. We learn how to rejoice in our own sufferings and daily deaths so that we too can rise with Him and see the glory of divine life at work in our every day world.
This time of Easter is a time to renew our awareness of sin, so that we are renewed in the hope of salvation. We can learn to confess our sins once again in the Holy Sacrament of Reconciliation so that we become more alive humanly and divinely. Let us give thanks for the forgiveness of sins and joyfully repent of all that separates us from God.